Hi, all. I’m writing for the folks who appreciate my writing. And the folks who are willing to think “What if he’s onto something? What would that mean?” rather than simply “He’s wrong,” at the outset.

Most of you, neighbors, have been the former, and for that I am so grateful.

Since I last posted, I got some solid guidance from Vermont League of Cities and Towns on what I, as a newly minted selectboard member, can say publicly, per the laws on these things. If I make clear that I’m just representing myself and don’t purport to be speaking with any authority granted me by the office, then I don’t forfeit first amendment rights. Happy to share the precise guidance with any who are curious.

Speaking of the board! I read 260 pages of briefing material for this week’s board meeting, and about 200 pages each for the three meetings before that. I’ve crafted policy that I’m excited to try to implement, should I get buy-in from stakeholders. And yet I still care about some “social issues.” So here I am, writing for you, for free. And I got paid to write for six years, full time!

(Did you know that the number of jobs in journalism in the U.S. decreased by more than 70% from 2000 to 2024?)

About social issues, a wise local friend told me recently that “folks who want their electeds to remain silent on many issues actually want support from those same officials on *other* issues. As it turns out, we *all* care about social issues.”

I have a hunch that that’s not a bad thing.

Here’s the meat of what I wanted to say today:

Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote this in his 1963 letter from a Birmingham jail:

I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.”

As you may judge by the fact that I am posting this, I agree wholeheartedly. I think the person who often disagrees with the method of achieving justice can be said to *effectively* disagree with that justice.

One pithy saying is that the centrist or moderate—I wonder if this also applies to the “good ol’ Vermont liberal”—always opposes the last war but never the current one. Always opposes the injustice that appears resolved but never the one clearly happening now. May I never be this person.

Gaza has now been more thoroughly obliterated than Dresden when the allies carpet-bombed it, according to those who’ve studied this. The Biden Administration has been *publicly* promoting a “two-state solution.” This would feature sovereign states of Israel and Palestine, both with separate territories not in dispute. But as of Wednesday this week, we know that in private diplomatic cables—where it counts—the administration has been advocating *against* a two-state solution. The revelation comes from a leak obtained by an old reporting buddy of mine, Ken Klippenstein. One must ask: what the heck are we doing?

I’ll share at this juncture something a radio host, Jesse Brenneman, wrote on social media last month:

“One trick for critical thinking I recommend is that if the behavior of a person or group defies all logic and seems like a series of baffling unforced errors that undermines their stated goal, try considering whether there’s a different goal that would align with that behavior.” 

I’ve been saying something like this for years but Brenneman said it better. In other words: The purpose of a system is what it does. Do you think Israel needed to destroy the homes of 1.5 million people, as they’ve done—that’s like every residential unit in Chicago—just to incapacitate or get revenge on a few hundred, or a few thousand, Hamas fighters? If not, then perhaps the primary purpose is making this land a place its former residents don’t want to, or can’t, return to. At very least, we need to consider the possibility that this is the Israel’s goal and that of it’s biggest ally, our own government.

When I was a writer, my primary weapon was public shame. I’d like to return to that era for a minute with a fact-based story. When the Biden administration stopped contributing funding to UNRWA, the aid agency feeding Gazans, Biden cited the idea that UNRWA staff had been assisting Hamas. Canada followed suit in refusing funding. But when it was revealed that the “confessions” were likely untrue, and had been tortured out of those aid workers, Canada and other countries reinstated funding.

Shortly thereafter, on March 26, our own lawmakers had the opportunity to make a correction based on this new information. After all, two million trapped people are in danger of starving to death; one million of them children. A member of Congress quickly proposed a foreign aid bill that didn’t restore UNRWA funding. Almost all other members voted for it. Vermont’s Becca Balint and Bernie Sanders, with some principle, voted against. Norwich resident and U.S. Senator Peter Welch inexplicably voted for it, continuing to keep back funding from the aid agency that provided the most life-saving food.

At last count, the number of trucks of food that Israel allows to enter Gaza today is something like 1/36th of the number of trucks before this “conflict” started, when no one was starving. Roughly the same number of people live there today. Let’s be real: what term would most accurately describe this situation? People in Gaza continue to eat animal feed. Israel recently issued a decree prohibiting animal feed from entering Gaza.

We’re all “good guys” and we’re all “bad guys.” Each of us individually, and this country we live in. It behooves us, both individually and as a country, to ask ourselves in what way we are the bad guy. And to deal with it. Not at some undefined future time as MLK would admonish—but right now. Not while maintaining the utmost respect for norms (which helped get us to this place), but by throwing norms out the window, if that’s what’s required to not be the “bad guy.”